


Autotomy

by SwoodMaxProductions



Category: Dead Cells (Video Game)
Genre: Adopted Children, Amputation, Angst with a Happy Ending, Autotomy, Blood, Blood Loss, Blood and Injury, Carrying, Creature Whump, Fainting, Found Family, Gen, Human Sacrifice, Hurt/Comfort, Kidnapping, Pre-Canon, Protectiveness, Rescue, Self-Harm, Self-Sacrifice, Whump, don’t worry it’s gecko tail stuff, self-amputation, that’s the gecko tail thing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-17
Updated: 2021-01-17
Packaged: 2021-03-15 22:01:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28820400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SwoodMaxProductions/pseuds/SwoodMaxProductions
Summary: autotomy (noun)the casting off of a part of the body (e.g. the tail of a lizard) by an animal under threat.When the Banished kidnap two children to sacrifice to Mama Tick, the Collector vows to get them home safely— even if he doesn’t exactly get back in one piece.A little headcanon based on the Collector’s lack of a certain feature it felt like he should have.
Relationships: The Collector & the Blacksmith, the Collector & the Blacksmith & the SMOL BEANS
Comments: 2
Kudos: 15





	Autotomy

**Author's Note:**

> LIZARB MAN........ DINOSER...................

“Got ‘em. The little rats.”

The small warband of Banished congregated around their tiny captives. The boys, the Blacksmith’s apprentice, Oliver, and his friend Guillain, shrank back against the bars of their cage.

They stared up in total terror at their mutated captors. They had heard the stories. They had seen the bodies. The Banished knew no mercy. Not even for children.

“Mama Tick will feast tonight.”

~~~

“...I don’t like this.”

The relative silence was broken by the Collector. He’d spent the past few hours worrying. Well, more than he usually did. Which, to be fair, was saying something.

“Yeah… they’ve been gone for a while now…”

Roland, the Blacksmith, had never seen him look up from his work so often. He was watching. Looking for Oliver and Guillain. But they didn’t arrive.

“I can’t,” he said abruptly, pulling away from his notes.

Though his hood obscured his face, his eyes carried a grim determination.

“Roland, is the new weapon ready?”

He knew. He knew exactly what the Havens’ alchemist intended to do. And he knew that no force on Earth could stop the Collector now. He handed his colleague the fruits of their labor, based on a design from… that glorified prison behind High Peak: the Sonic Carbine 2.0. An arcane resonator repurposed into a formidable weapon.

“Doctor. I’ll get everybody around, you don’t have t—“

“Yes,” said the Collector, staring him dead in the eyes, “Yes I do.”

And he was gone. The Blacksmith shook his head. Even in the state he was in, he still had the signature sophisaurid speed.

~~~

He could smell them. He was bleeding from a few wounds the giant ticks had given him, but he was  _ close. _ He’d managed to avoid detection, for the most part. He hoped with everything he had left that the children were alive.

_ There. _

There was a group of Banished up ahead, transporting a cage… it was them. He inched closer. If he could get in range to shoot accurately without hurting them…

Suddenly, the Banished opened the cage and scattered. There were only seconds before the reason became clear: Mama Tick, god-beast of the marshes, tore out of the muck with ravenous fury.

It was now or never. The Collector lunged, opening fire on the gigantic insect to draw her away from the children. The handful of Banished whirled around. Damn it.

_ “RUN!” _

The boys did as instructed. The Banished howled with rage and began to chase after them. The effort was met with the Collector’s sonic carbine fire, covering the boys’ escape. He was now facing multiple opponents, one of which was the size of a house.

It was a brutally unfair fight. Though the sonic carbine didn’t use physical ammunition, its charge still needed to ‘reload’, leaving the Collector to frantically dodge attacks while it recharged. It was made even more difficult by the mud of the Morass. By the time the Banished that had kidnapped Oliver and Guillain were dead, the Collector had already been wounded. One of their bladed spears had managed to slash a sizable wound on his upper back, Mama Tick had gouged his left leg and implants along his side with her claws, and another had even managed to run him through, though their spear had come back coated in blue bioplasm instead of blood— right before the Collector shot them.

Mama Tick, on the other hand, was still going strong, despite losing two eyes. She had dozens more, and the Collector knew that in his current state, he couldn’t risk it. He ran, leading the mutant parasite queen off of the children’s trail.

Everything seemed twice as heavy in the thick mud, and the giant tick was gaining on the struggling sophisaurid. Natural speed couldn’t save the Collector here. This was the domain of the ticks. A claw came down, and he could  _ feel  _ it narrowly miss his head. He was almost to solid ground. If he could just make it a bit longer, he could outrun—

Another claw came down. This one struck true, impaling the Collector’s tail and pulling him down into the mud with a scream of pain and terror.

She pulled him towards her hideous jaws, and he frantically pulled a dagger— and plunged it into his own tail. With a sickening separation of vertebrae, the Banished’s insect-god was left with the Collector’s twitching, severed tail still skewered on her claw, staring at it in slow, bestial confusion as the Collector himself scrambled to safety.

~~~

A heavy thump somewhere down the passage interrupted the joyous reunion of the children with their caretaker. Moving toward the source of the sound, a sick feeling in the back of the Blacksmith’s mind told him he already knew what it was.

And he was right.

The Collector lay slumped in the hallway, caked with mud and his own blood and bioplasm. Facedown and motionless, his tail was gone, a bloody stump all that was left. He didn’t respond to Roland’s voice, or to the horrified cries of the children following him, begging him to wake up. Roland had to physically restrain the boys to keep them from running to him.

He was alive, but very much unconscious. He must have passed out on the way back… The Blacksmith gently gathered up the Collector’s gangly body. It was ultimately something a health fountain could heal, and knew where the man kept his things. In time, the Collector’s tail would grow back. He adjusted his hold on him on the way back, keeping the Collector’s hood in place and his face obscured. The poor alchemist may have been a complete ragdoll in his arms, but it was the least he could do to respect the man’s wishes.

~~~

“...Mmh…”

The Collector began to stir, opening his eyes to find Oliver sitting at his bedside, fast asleep. But where was… No.  _ No. _

Managing to sit up a bit to search the room, the Collector was relieved to find Guillain curled up in a little ball on the floor. Thank goodness. They were both safe…

His eyes slipped shut as he smiled.

Now, and only now, he could rest.


End file.
